It is sometimes desired for a memory device, such as a memory card, to perform a time-based activity, such as, but not limited to, determining whether a digital rights management (DRM) license has expired. Many memory devices do not have a battery and, thus, are unable to run an internal real-time clock to keep track of time. Some memory devices rely upon a software agent running in a host device to provide the memory device with a time stamp. In operation, the software agent running in the host device would obtain a time stamp from an external time source (such as a time server in a network) and send the signed time stamp to the memory device. Since the software agent obtains the time stamp from an external time source, the memory device will not be able to receive a time stamp from the external time source when the host device is not able to connect to the external time source (e.g., when the host device is not connected to the Internet or loses its wireless connection) or if the host is not running the agent (e.g., if the agent is not supported by the host platform, if the agent was terminated, etc.). In such a situation, the memory device can perform a time-based activity using a previously-received time stamp. However, performing the time-based activity with a stale time stamp may lead to an inefficient or unintended result (e.g., allowing access to content based on the stale time stamp even though the content license is actually expired).